The Hall of Shame

98% of all landscape specialists will be what they say they are: knowledgeable, conscientious and professional in all their dealings.

Unfortunately the remaining 2% are not. Their activities in the name of ‘landscape gardening’ are often driven by the desire to turn a quick profit, backed by ignorance and the belief anybody can do it. The Hall of Shame is dedicated to warning you what can happen when you allow expediency to get in the way of solid informed decision making about whom you choose to do your work.

Cheapest and quickest is NOT always best. Here are some true stories:

• The unqualified ‘tree guy’ topped a 30-year-old oak leaving it stunted and crippled (ten minutes with a chainsaw in the wrong hands can ruin your carefully planned landscape).
• You've shouted the ‘gardeners’ a dozen beer for a good day’s planting. Six weeks later you notice all the plants have been planted in their plastic bags.
• Your large expensive trees have been planted into stinky, sticky clay - with an empty cigarette packet and pie wrappers for good measure!
• Washing concreting tools into drains, permanently blocking them.
• The ‘palm tree merchant’ in his souped-up Holden on-selling large specimens at ludicrous prices.
• Overzealous weeding. There’s nothing quite like coming home from a hard day’s work and finding half your garden on some unregistered trailer up your drive. The reason? The ‘gardeners’ didn’t know a weed from a plant - or maybe they were planting a new garden elsewhere and stocking it with yours.
• Advising what plants are best suited to a site… without a clue!
• Plants purchased on ‘super-special’ either die or fail to thrive. (They were probably cheap for a very good reason ... they are puckeroo-ed. That’s a technical term for hopelessly root bound, dried out, etc.)

Have you had any memorable experiences with idiotic or downright shifty operators? We want to hear from you.

Please feel free to submit any stories or experiences to: